According to Institute of Health and Welfare reports, Australia ranks second only to Scandinavia in terms of new type 1 diabetes cases.
The report indicates that every year 3 per cent more children are being diagnosed with the disease. Katherine Faulks, of the Institute, reportedly commented:
“In children 0-14 years, in the year 2000 we found that there were 761 new cases in the year. And then in 2006 we found that there were 916 new cases. In the older age groups, for that is those aged 15 years and over, we found that they were almost 9,000 new cases of type 1 diabetes, however their rates remained fairly stable. And in fact in the older age groups, so those aged over 40, the rates decreased slightly.”
Another Australian diabetes expert, the president of Diabetes Australia, Dr. Gary Deed, was reported in the news as commenting: “We might be able to find that yes, there are certain viruses which might affect certain people and allow them to develop type 1 diabetes . If we found that out, well then it may be a short road to developing a vaccine against those viruses to protect patients. If there are food issues such as, the controversy around certain cow’s milk proteins, if that is true the research can be developed and prove, well then they’re the things that we can initiate to reduce risk to people.”

Get our free newsletters

Stay up to date with the latest news, research and breakthroughs.